Boosting network performance?

Question

i have just set up a new network , i bought a 24 port D-Link switch (10/100MB) and i have bought 8 network cards for my 8 computers i wanna connect ...i have used the T-568B Straight-through wiring method all my cable , plugs are plugged good and i have set up static ip's on all my computers (192.168.0.1 ......8) the connection distance between each computer and the switch is about 10 to 20 meters which is not a long distance for a signal to be lost ...my problem is that my network is slow for example if i want to open a shared folder on a remote computer when i double click that folder i have to wait for 20 to 30 seconds for that folder to open ...i used the ping to see if there are dropped packets and my reply was >1ms which is great , i even tried to mess with LMhosts also no change , what can i do to speed up my network ??? thanks in advance for any ideas

they are only 8 pc's and i use them for simple file sharing i have no traffic at them , i have worked with other networks with no routers and they are faster i suspected that the switch might be faulty and i changed it still the same result and this is where my experience drains :)

first of all i ping by ip address
i use shares by network neighbor hood
i have no specific server just the computer are in the same workgroup with the same ip config.....(simple network)

Answer 1

close open ports or unsued ports...

Answer 2

we may need more information, but I will work on assumptions first:
1:Since the ping response is good, it's not a physical network issue. The primary issue is network share browsing in a peer to peer network, all Windows XP or 2K.
2: Since we are dealing with a P2P file sharing environment, (no WINS server) routing is not an issue as information does not go beyond you network.

Q: When you ping what do you use, names or IP addresses?
Q: When you try to access a network share how are you doing it, Network Neighborhood, or start>run>\\servername\share, or start>run>\\ipaddress\sharename

Answer 3

It depends on how much simaltameous activity you have on the computers on your network but I think you need a router. A switch only cuts back on your collision domain you need to limit your broad cast domain.